


Another Life

by witheredbutterfly



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types
Genre: A Few Years After Blood of Olympus, F/F, F/M, Flirting, M/M, Original Character(s), Original Character-centric, Past Abuse, Past Rape/Non-con, Quests, Shyness, Slow Build, dirtier stuff will come later, i'll add in more tags as things progress
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-09-01
Updated: 2015-09-13
Packaged: 2018-04-18 11:09:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 15,299
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4703852
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/witheredbutterfly/pseuds/witheredbutterfly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Takes place a few years after the events of Blood of Olympus.<br/>The story's about how a group of four teens - each with their own troubled histories - find out they can escape from their pasts by diving into a whole new world as Greek demigods and heroes. But with new freedoms come new dangers that bring out all of the characters' worst memories, fears and extreme emotions. Isn't a world of loss and chaos something they were trying to leave behind?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Just Another Day

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first fanfic, like, ever! And I'm really excited about it. Although I don't know really how good of a writer I am, for no one can truly judge their own writings without bias, I'm still going to write this for my own personal pleasure (but of course, if I pick up a few fans that like my work on the way, their pleasure, too!). I've always loved writing as a kid, so why not trying out writing a story based off one of my favorite series of all time? Hopefully, people come to read this and enjoy it, but even if they don't, I'm still having fun with it. I'm going to post chapters as frequently as possible, so one a week at the slowest pace. So, here goes! PJO fans, welcome to "Another Life" by me, witheredbutterfly.

Just Another Day

 

The beautiful boy cradled in my arms looked up into my eyes as we laid down together on the bed, basking in the warmth of each other, just staring at one another with love and passion in our eyes, savoring the-

"How's the steak, Steve?"

Suddenly I was startled from my daydream and realized I was staring into a plate of spaghetti and not some make-believe boyfriend. Quizzically I stared at my grandmother.

"What?" I asked in reply.

"Yes, Darla, what're you talking about?" My grandfather next to me looked just about as confused as I was. "I know you decided to opt out from the meal tonight, but you did cook it, sweetheart. You should know what it is."

"She's just joking, Grandpa," I said smiling faintly, slightly amused at yet another of Grandma's weird jokes. But when I looked at her, she seemed completely serious. Her expression then suddenly changed, looking happy like her normally kindhearted self.

"You two are right, silly me," she said, grinning. "I'm not stupid enough to forget I made my boys spaghetti for Pasta Monday's dinner!" She giggled and looked out our small home's window. Following her gaze outside, I looked out to see the nice, sunny spring sky in the large town we lived in, her in the suburbs of New Jersey, right outside the city of Philadelphia. A few small clouds scattered high above the other small buildings and houses in the vicinity.

"Well, as you can see, it's getting pretty late and I'm feeling pretty tired. Goodnight! I'm off to bed to get some nice sleep." She laughed at her own random overenthusiasm and walked out of the dining room to head to her and Grandpa's bedroom.

My smile faltered. It wasn't even half past six yet. Maybe another one of her abnormal jokes or something like that? I looked at Grandpa, hoping for an answer. He just shrugged.

"You know how she's been acting weird lately. It's probably just old age. We are in our seventies, you know."

"Yeah, I guess you're right. Nothing to be worried about..."

But that's exactly what it was. Something to worry about.

••••••

The next day I was sitting on the bus on my way to school when I felt something hard launch into the back of my head. Turning around, I noticed it was the usual "bully" - Jon Lucid. But he was anything but comprehensible. He moved to my town of Swedesboro around year ago from Camden with his mom, and he was what one would call "ghetto trash", and although I don't prefer to use demeaning terms like that, that was unfortunately what he was. One of those wannabe gangsters that are so focused on trying to be tough to impress his other friends that he doesn't even make an attempt to get a decent education. He likes to try and pick on me, but really he's just still upset from when I... well, when I dumped him. When he first moved to Swedesboro I sort of had a crush on him. It's not like you could blame me - he was hot. Like one of those tall, dark and handsome men you'll see in a magazine or on an Abercrombie shopping bag. Truth be told, I was too oblivious to see he was a douche at the time. And I was also his first. Yeah, I took his virginity. But it's not like he took mine. We were both sixteen at the time, both sophomores, and when I broke up with him the week after, he didn't take it well. At all. Still texting me, saying how he wanted to get back together, apologizing every night for tormenting me during the day. Bastard.

I felt a quarter fall down the back of my shirt, probably the thing I felt hit me. I watched as he laughed to himself, but then his best friend Rob -another one of my cute exes I took the virginity of, just a two week fling who took the break up much better than Jon- flicked his ear, hard. 

"What?" he asked Rob. "It's not like he doesn't deserve it! You should know, too. Like he needs any more pity than he already gets. That slutty cocksucker sho-"

"Maybe you're just being a little whiny brat because he dumped your bastard ass and he wouldn't fuck you again if you two were the last men on earth."

"Damn, Snow! You have a fire in you today! ...That's actually pretty ironic. Ha!" 

Snow Hailtok and Jewel Roa - the two best friends anyone could ask for. Snow was cold hearted to anyone other than me and Jewel, being the protective bestie that she was. And she was not bad to look at, either. Delicate, beautiful pale skin and pastel yellow hair falling down to the small of her back, with some of the brightest blue eyes I've ever seen. Jewel was also quite the beauty, even though she wasn't too bright. Yeah, you could call her a dumb blonde because of her dirty blonde hair, but she was a kind, caring dumb blonde. I could always count on her to help me handle my... slightly varying and flexible love life, since hers was just as wild. She was also a hippie deep down on the inside, every once and a while referring to her zen mode and Snow' aura and juju and stuff like that. Her eyes were totally crazy, changing colors with her emotions to anything from blue, brown, green, gray, amber and hazel. The local doctor said it was some rare disorder found in a few people around the world, but it was completely harmless. Others called the three of us the Whore Herd to try and be mean to us, but we just kind of laughed at that. It was pretty creative after all.

"You bitch!" Jon growled, voice cracking as it wavered with the evident pain he was trying to hide. "You and your idiot friend who follows you and him like a lost puppy!"

"Who?" Jewel asked, confused.

"The dumb jock's trying to insult you," Snow answered as she took her seat next to me, followed by Jewel, filling the seat.

"Oh. Heheh. That's funny," was the giggled reply.

"Dumb sluts. All three of you!" Jon yelled as he stood up from his seat, voice cracking again on "three."

"Stop."

Rob roughly grabbed Jon's shoulder and yanked him down next to him, in their seat in the back of the bus. "Stop being a jerk."

Jewel gasped. "This is like a scene from a soap opera, and I get to be a part of it!" she squealed. "Oh. My. God. Snow. Did you see that one episode of Happy Days where..."

As Jewel rambled on to Snow about some TV show from years ago, her ADHD causing her to completely forget the encounter that happened literally seconds ago, I looked around at the other teens on the bus. None of them seemed to have paid any attention to the small fight that just occurred. Their own collective chatter combined with the outside noises pouring in from the open windows was loud enough to drown our voices out from our bus driver, Linda. To them, this was seemingly just another day in Swedesboro.

••••

Lunch came around after a few hour of classes, but before I could walk through the cafeteria doors, I was stopped by a voice from the other end of the halls.

"Steve! Wait up!"

I turned around to see a pair of deep gray eyes looking directly at me. Rob? Why did he want to talk to me. After all, we really didn't talk too much after we broke up, only the occasional "hi" in the halls or conversations on schoolwork if we were paired together in our chemistry class. I always wanted to repair our relationship, become friends again or something, but I didn't want to feel like I was intruding on his life. What if he didn't want to be friends now? What if he didn't want me?

"Steve, can I talk with you for a sec?"

"Um... sure, I guess. If you really want to. But you don't have to! I-"

"Stop being so adorable," Rob said, smiling. "Innocent. You haven't changed at all, have you?"

He was gorgeous! Why did we break up again? The sex was great, he was great... I felt my cheeks light up. Did he notice? "I guess not." I looked away darkly. "But you of all people should know I'm not innocent." 

"Well, yeah, you do have a really extensive list of past lovers, to say the least. Me, uh, being one of them. Or are you referring to what happened with your father..? Whatever, you know what I meant. I just wanted to say... Look. I'm sorry for how Jon's been treating you for the last year or so. I, well, on the bus I told him I wasn't talking to him anymore."

I was stunned. I thought those two were close. I thought Rob disliked me, too, like some weird ex-boyfriend pact against me or something. "Oh... okay."

"But what I'm really sorry for is is not talking to you after we broke up. I was sad, yes, but I was ignorant to not talk to you because of meager emotions. Befriending a Neanderthal like that wasn't a plausible solution either."

"You lost me at the SAT words," I said, cutting the blonde boy off. 

"What I'm trying to say is... I was wrong to not talk to you after you dumped me. It's not like we were some serious couple, even if you were my first. I want to start talking to you again. Like... friends."

I looked down to the ground, only to realize that my lunch box was still in my hand. Lunch. Oops. I looked through the doors, seeing Jewel and Snow sitting at one of the tables inside. What are you doing? Jewel mouthed. I grinned embarrassed at her, and look back to Rob. 

"Sit with me and my friends?" I asked shyly. 

"I'd love to."

I led him over to the table the girls were sitting at. Snow glared at him.

"Robert Towamense. Hi." 

"I know who you are. You're one of Steve's exes. And one of the douche's friends," Snow said coldly. "Have you turned into a douche, too?"

"I don't think so..."

"Snow, he's one of the nicer ones." Jewel grinned sweetly at him. "Sit down, Rob."

Snow huffed, but let him sit.

"So I heard Christopher Quartell has been wanting to talk to you for a while now," Jewel said after a few moments of awkward silences eating. "From Spanish?"

"Me? Why?"

"Why do you think?" Snow said sarcastically.

"Oh! Um... you mean, like a date or something?" I asked, blushing again for the second time in only a few minutes.

"Duh, silly,” Jewel answered. “You and your little innocent act attracts every guy and girl you know!"

"Why is everyone calling me innocent today? I lost my innocence when my father put his dick in my ass when I was seven years old." I said nonchalantly.

“That turned kinda dark fast,” commented Snow.

"What she means to say is that you're really sweet and people like that about you, cutie" Rob flirtatiously whispered in my ear, effectively changing the mood. I giggled.

"Shut up! I'm not cute!" I said jokingly.

"You're gorgeous."

"You. Stop," Snow said, pointing a finger at Rob from across the table. "It didn't work the first time. Cut it. And you," Snow moved her finger to Jewel to her left as Rob moved back away from me and averted his eyes. "Tell us more about Chris."

"Well, Jesse, one of my little sophomore gossip minions from the squad said that Chris told her friend Ashley that he really wanted to talk to you. Said it was like, super urgent. But it was weird - I think she, like, said other names after yours, as if he needed to talk to them, too. But I zoned out thinking about your first date when she mentioned your name first!"

Being the senior captain of the cheerleading squad, Jewel was able to get a lot of dirt from all of the grades under her from her fellow teammates. Her and Snow were both seniors, while Rob and I were only juniors. I was lucky to have those two girls. When I moved here, after... it happened, they were the first people I met, them being my neighbors and all. It was sweet how at first they tried to protect me from any person who wanted to woo me or ask me out on dates, but I sort of whored myself around all the guys and girls in high school. I just... when my father raped me, it hurt me. A lot. And I don’t mean emotionally, like, it really hurt my ass. He bruised me when he held me down and I bled and I cried and I... I just needed to know if sex actually hurt all the time. Jewel said it was amazing after her first time happened with her old boyfriend when they were 13, and that's when my sex mission started. Since then I've dated at least half the people in our school, seeing if sex always hurt as bad as my first time. It didn't. It felt really, really great. But on my little sex journey, I never really found what I was REALLY searching for -love. Ugh, I'm such a sap.

"Jewel - what if the other names were important?" Snow inquired.

"Oh... well, whatever. I'll ask Jess next practice. But until then - keep a lookout for Chris." She winked, causing me to look away, embarrassed. I glanced at Rob for some sort of support, but he was just staring disdainfully at his sandwich in front of him on the table. He looked really hot angry. The way his soft lips pointed slightly downward, gray eyes growing stormy, and his sharp, perfect jawline... Why did I break up with him again? I stared at him for a few seconds before I realized what I was doing. No! I told myself. He wanted to be friends. Really flirty friends, I guess. But not boyfriends. Not again.

••••

I came back home after school that day after a pretty boring bus ride, unlike earlier that day. This time around, though, I sat with Rob in a two-seater in front of a sleeping Jewel and an unhappy Snow. But we didn't talk much, too tired from the gym period at the end of the day.

I went into my room to find Grandma asleep in my bed. Well, that was weird. Not only is this not her room, she usually goes out with her other old friends on Tuesday afternoons.

"Grandma," I said, shaking her gently. "What are you doing here in my bed? Shouldn't you be out with the girls?"

"Tyler? Oh, Steve! You're not my husband! Ha!" She sat up in the bed. "And what do you mean, be out? It's Saturday."

Oh no. I know Grandpa had said not to worry, but these little slip-ups had been going on for a few months now, and they were only getting worse. I was starting to get really worried. My uncle used to work at an assisted living home and I remembered hearing stories about all of the old people he took care of back in Iowa before I moved in with my grandparents. Stories about all of the funny things the people with Alzheimer's did. What if... what if Grandma had that? Suddenly those stories didn't seem so funny.

But I didn't have much time to think about that because the window inside my bedroom suddenly exploded inward. 

Everything happened in slow motion. The glass slowly burst inward, a small four inch shard impaling itself in Grandma's right eye, causing her to scream before limply falling to the ground in a heap, blood pouring out of her eye socket around the glass. I sobbed, staring in shock at my suddenly dead grandmother until my grandfather rushed into my room and yanked me out into the hallway, carrying a large, bronze sword. An evilly grinning woman with fiery hair and two unusual legs - one an animal's leg, the other some sort of prosthetic or something, started crawling through the opening. Before she could even get fully through though, Grandpa thrust his sword through her flaming skull, causing her body to dissolve into dust with a loud, echoing screech. 

I sobbed again, vomiting in the hallway at the gruesome event that happened right in front of me. 

"Listen, Steve," Grandpa said, but I was in too much shock to notice. "Steve!" He slapped me hard across the face, the sting bringing me back to reality. "Listen to me, Steven. You are a demigod. You know, like the stories about Hercules? And the Greek gods? All real."

"What the hell just happened? What do you mean it's all real?"

"You are a child of Aphrodite. So is your friend Jewel. Snow and your ex-boyfriend are demigods, too. Get them and go to Christopher Quartell's house. 32 Brick Avenue."

"Okay. Okay. Oh my god. Grandma is dead!" 

"Steve! I know it's hard, but stay focused, and stay calm. She... she was going to die anyway. Alzheimer's. I think you knew that, though. Think of this as... a euthanasia of some sort."

"Euthanasia?! Grandma - your wife - is dead!"

"I know! But you will be too - very soon - if you don't get your three friends and go to Christopher's house! Now!"

He grabbed my hand, picking me up off my knees from when I threw up on the floor. I was so confused, furious, sad. My grandmother was just stabbed in the eye by a flying piece of glass in an explosion caused by some fire woman? It made no sense. I needed answers. And according to my grandfather, Christopher Quarell had them. I needed to get my friends and one of my many, many ex-boyfriends to him as quick as possible. And that's exactly what I was going to do.


	2. An Explanation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve collects his friends and goes to Christopher's house to try an get an explanation of the tragedy that has just occurred.

An Explanation

 

"Snow!"

I was standing in front of the door of the house three down from mine: Snow's house. After crying for about ten minutes on the sidewalk in front of my house, I finally decided to get up and walk to her house.

"Who the hell is it?" I heard from behind the door. Snow opened it with a glare, her expression softening when she saw it was me.

"Oh my god, Steve. You look like shit. Is that a piece of glass sticking out of your shoulder?!"

I looked down to my left only to see a shard of glass sticking out of my body. Only now as I noticed it did it start to hurt. Acting on instinct, I grunted as I immediately yanked the shard out of my arm.

"Yes. It was. But we don't have time for that now. Someone attacked my house. A crazy woman with fire hair and a stump leg - I know, I sound insane, but now Grandma is dead and I'm bleeding out of my arm and we're Greek demigods and we need to get Jewel -"

"Steve, stop. You're rambling. I don't know what you mean by demigods and a crazy woman with fire hair, but considering you probably didn't stab yourself with glass and your grandmother is dead, I'll believe you. Lucky enough for you, Jewel is upstairs in my bedroom. We were doing... girly makeup stuff, you wouldn't care. What do you need us for?"

Something in my gut told me she was lying, but that really didn't matter at the time. "My grandfather said that the three of us and one of my exes are demigods. Like Achilles and all that stuff from Greek mythology. And that me and Jewel are children of... Aphrodite? Wait a minute - she's the beauty goddess, right? That doesn't make any sense... I'm not really all that-"

"Steven Charisma Domani. You are hot. I am a lesbian, and I'd still fuck you. Stop being so insecure."

"Whatever, no time for one of your motivational speeches. We apparently have to get Jewel and this mystery ex to Chris. Yes, the Chris Jewel mentioned earlier today."

"Um... okay." She nodded firmly. She then turned around, facing the staircase a few feet behind her. "Jewel! Get down here! NOW! It's Steve!"

I don't think I've ever seen Jewel move so fast. In split seconds she was halfway down the staircase, jumping off of the fifth step to the bottom.

"Oh my god. Steve. What happened to you? You're bleeding! Your hair's all messed up! Your eyes look greener than usual! Why? There're cuts in your shirt! And your aura… it’s so dark. Filled with fear, loss. Steve!"

"He said some crazy woman with fiery hair attacked him. Killed his grandmother," Snow supplied.

"Really? That's so sad. I loved your grandmother. I can't believe this! But... a fiery woman? Attacked you? That's weird..."

"Yeah, I know it's weird, Jewel," I said smugly. "Woman with fire hair and donkey legs aren't really normal around Swedesboro."

"No, not that. The fact that she attacked you!" 

"What do you mean?" Snow questioned.

"I mean, that I've seen one before, too. But she growled at me. It was kind of funny. So I just told her to go away, and then she did. You should have just tried that," Jewel said like it was some obvious decision.

"That's... interesting?" Snow said confused.

"Yeah... Anyway, we need to find one of my ex-boyfriends and being all four of us to Chris. And not for sex, mind you. He apparently can tell us what's going on," I explained.

"Well, which ex? You have like, two hundred," Jewel said.

"I do not have that many," I said defensively.

"I stopped counting once you hit triple digits." 

"Snow!"

"Sorry, but it's true. They don't call us the Whore Herd for nothing, Stevie," Snow said. 

"And you're our main slut!" Jewel added happily.

“I thought I only had like, thirty to forty something…”

“Only?” Jewel asked, cocking an eyebrow.

“Well, I’m also counting your one night stands. So yeah, you’re probably reaching triple digits.”

"But... I'm not good enough for-"

"Jesus Christ, he's never gonna stop with this Jewel. Let's just get in my car and go to Chris to find out what the hell is going on."

"But what about Steve's unnamed ex?" 

"Well, maybe Chris can tell us who it is," Snow answered.

"Ohhhh... Good idea, Snow!" Jewel said cheerily.

"Yeah, yeah. I'm amazing. Get in the car."

••••

Six minutes later and we were at the other end of town in front of Chris' house. The door opened swiftly, revealing a short and slightly pudgy guy I didn't really see too often in school - Christopher Quartell. Mostly because he was one of the smarter kids in my grade, and I, being dyslexic, didn't really have any classes with him. The Phillies cap he usually wore sat on top of his short, curly almond-brown hair as he leant on one of the crutches he had to use to get around.

"Thank the gods you're here!" he said, sounding relieved. He walked out the door and sniffed the air around me. You smell like empousai, and you're bleeding. Did one get to you?"

"I smell like a what?" I asked.

"Were you attacked by a woman with flaming hair, fangs, and two weird legs?"

"Um, yes? How'd you know?" I inquired.

"Come inside, you three. Sit down in the living room and I'll explain everything." He motioned to the room next to him, pointing at the couch and telling us to sit down on the couch. 

"Take off your shirt, let me see the wound," Chris ordered.

But when I lifted my arm to pull it off, a huge surge of pain spread through my arm and torso.

"Oh, duh. Sorry," Chris apologized. "Here, I'll help. Stand back up for me?"

I stood up, blushing as Chris slowly peeled my red T-shirt over my head. I noticed his eyes rested on my stomach.

"Stop staring, start helping," Snow said sharply.

"Sorry, sorry," Chris said. "I just... wasn't expecting those."

"I know, right?" Jewel agreed. "All the loose shirts he wears and you can't see how gorgeous his body is! Aren't his abs so hot? Natural, too!" 

I self-consciously covered up my bare body with my right arm. "Stop it, guys," I said slightly flattered but highly embarrassed. Chris' eyes moved up to my wounded arm.

"It looks like the bleeding has stopped," he informed. "But I can still get you something to stop the pain and make it heal faster. I'll be right back."

We watched as he walked out of the room until Jewel's eyes landed on me. 

"He was so checking you out."

"No shit, Sherlock," Snow said, rolling her eyes. 

"No he was not," I said, pouting slightly.

"He practically admitted to it," Snow said. "I've known you for years, and you still appall me. You've had so much sex. How can you not be used to people thinking you're attractive?"

"I..."

"I'm back!" 

Chris reentered the room holding some weird sort of food in his hand and an oddly colored drink in the other.

"I was expecting Tylenol," Jewel said puzzled. 

"I don't do drugs," I said, pushing away the offered things.

"It's not drugs, it's magical healing supplements," Chris replied.

"Sounds like drugs to me."

"How about I give you a brief explanation of what's going on with the three of you - speaking of which, where's Rob?"

"Rob?" I asked. "What does he have to do with this?"

"He's the fourth demigod. Child of... Athena, I think. But I can't be sure."

"Wait, he's the ex I was supposed to find?"

Chris huffed, irritated. "Well, yeah, you were supposed to know that. Anyway…

"You three are all demigods. Half human, half, well, god. Greek god, that is. Each of you is a child of one of the many, many Greek gods. Maybe even one you haven't heard of. All those 'myths' about heroes like Hercules and gods like Zeus are true. Unfortunately, that also means that all the monsters from the myths are also real. You were just attacked by one of them - an empousa. "

"Well, how do we not get attacked by these monsters?" Jewel questioned.

"There are two safe havens in the U.S. for demigods like you - Camp Half-Blood in New York, and Camp Jupiter for the Roman demigods. Sometimes the gods like to go into their Roman forms... for some reason. Anyway, in a few minutes we'll leave to go get Rob and hop on a train to New York."

"Wait - what about our families?" Jewel asked. "We can't just leave them to go to some random place in another state."

"Jewel," Snow said softly. "I think... Even though it sounds weird, I think we need to do what he's telling us to. If it means being safe, we might have to leave our families."

"Easy for you to say," Jewel shot back harshly. "You live with a foster father you despise."

"And you live with a father who ignores you,” Snow fired, unfazed. “Will he even notice you're gone, Jewel? Do you really care about leaving him?"

"...You're right. If I need to do it for my safety, I have to leave him."

"But what about my Grandfather?" I asked.

"He sent you here," Chris said. "He knew this time would come eventually - he'll be fine. And it's not like you can't visit him. Camp Half-Blood isn't a prison."

I looked at Snow and Jewel for an answer. I couldn't believe that this was actually happening. My grandmother died and now apparently I'm half Greek god? They looked at me as if I was making the call.

"Fine, Chris," I said, taking the supposed magical healy stuff. "Let's get Rob and head to this camp in New York."


	3. Arrival

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The train ride to New York, and the arrival at the camp.

Arrival

 

Watching Rob’s reaction to all the sudden information on the train from Philly to NYC was kind of cute in a way. Seeing his shocked reaction in the seat across from me was adorable. A few people noticed the blood stain on my shirt, but didn’t say anything about it.

“Okay…” Rob started. “But if we’re all supposedly half god, which gods are our parents?”

“My grandfather told me that I was a child of Aphrodite,” I said. “And so were you, Jewel.” 

“It fits,” Rob, Snow and Chris said at the same time. They looked at each other quizzically after, all thinking about how creepy that just was.

“So… we’re siblings?” Jewel asked, looking to her left at me.

“That’s so weird,” I muttered aloud.

“Why? Would I be a bad sister?” Jewel challenged.

“Nonono! I didn’t say that!”

“I always thought you two had a pretty big sibling-like thing going on there,” Snow commented.

“Thinking about it now, I guess it technically is possible,” Rob added. “You’re ten months apart - and exactly like each other in so many ways.”

“We were very sure that Jewel was a child of Aphrodite, because of how your eyes work,” Chris stated next to Rob. “When you went to your town’s doctor - who was a child of Apollo, a previous resident of the camp - he told us about how your eyes change color with your emotions.” 

“Really?” Jewel asked excitedly, eyes changing to a bright blue with her sudden change of emotion. 

“But why don’t my eyes change color, if I’m her brother?” I asked quietly.

“I thought your eyes looked hazel earlier,” Jewel said. “When you came and got me and Snow when… yeah”

“Well, right now your eyes are a dark brown,” Chris said. “That means you’re feeling shy, sad, or embarrassed -”

“His only three emotions,” Snow interrupted.

“Well, then it makes sense. Children of Aphrodite also have blue eyes when they’re excited or surprised, green if they’re happy or just normal, gray when angry, hazel if you get scared or angry - which can explain Jewel’s observation - and amber if you’re… aroused.”

“Oh,” Rob said. “So when we, um, had sex… okay. That makes sense.”

“Did you, um, were my eyes amber then?” I asked, feeling my cheeks 

warm up. Rob nodded.

“I thought I was seeing things, but, uh, yeah.”

“Oh…”

“It was hot,” Rob whispered almost inaudibly.

“Wait a minute,” Chris interjected. “You two are dating? And you aren’t a virgin?”

Snow and Jewel laughed at that, while Rob joined me in the blushing. “No, they aren’t dating - anymore,” Jewel answered. “And no, Steve’s not a virgin. You could say that.” She looked at me and giggled.

“Sorry, again,” Chris told me flustered. “I- well, you see, I’m not always in the loop with gossip and all, and-”

“I know, a lot of people think I’m a virgin,” I said, smiling slightly at him. 

“He certainly seems like one, that’s for sure,” Snow supplied on the other side of Jewel. “With all of his blushing and insecurities.”

“Such a cutie!” Jewel giggled, eyes flashing green.

“But… Whose child am I?” Snow inquired.

“I get a really icy scent from you,” Chris answered. “Probably a child of Khione - goddess of snow or something. Everyone does call you Snow after all, even if your name’s actually Allison.”

“No,” Jewel said. “No, she lived with her birthmother.”

“Lived?” Chris questioned.

Lived. Jewel and I both knew what happened with Snow and her mother. When Snow’s mother fell in love, she fell hard. She didn’t so well when Snow’s apparently godly father left her; she only felt stable when she was with a man. She had a few men come and go, but when they left her, too, she started to blame her daughter. She started to abuse Snow, verbally at first, but it soon grew into slaps, punches, beatings, whippings. It hardened Snow in a way, draining her emotions. Until one snowy day a few years ago when Snow was eleven, when her mother had been drinking - heavily - she pulled a knife on her. Snow ran on instinct, bolting outside, picking an icicle from under her mom’s car and driving it through her mom’s throat when she came outside. She didn’t shed a tear - she just called me and Jewel to come see, help her on what to do next. We helped her lie to the police, said it was some freak accident. After all, why and how could a sweet little girl murder her mother in such a gruesome way? Lucky enough, she was able to live with a foster family living in our neighborhood. One might think that Jewel and I would be scared of Snow after the incident, but we weren’t. It’s not like she’s some evil person. She was our best friend, and she was going to stay our best friend no matter what.

“Let’s just say she’s not alive anymore,” Snow said, voice monotoned. 

“Oh,” Chris replied. “Okay. Anyway, your godly parent will claim you soon after you enter camp. We’ll find out then.”

“And you said my mother was… who, exactly?”

“Athena, goddess of wisdom.”

“But I’m not smart - I’m dyslexic. I can barely read a children’s book.”

“Wisdom doesn’t always apply to booksmarts, Rob,” Chris pointed out. “And the four of you aren’t really dyslexic, you’re just meant to read and speak Greek. It’s, like, ingrained in your brains.”

“How do you know all of this?” Snow interrogated.

“Are you a demigod, too?” Jewel inquired.

“Why do you keep talking about our scents?” Rob questioned.

I watched silently as my three friends loaded a frenzy of questions onto Chris, until the door guy looked like he was about to have an anxiety attack.

“Guys,” I said softly. “Lay off him, let him explain. You can’t just bombard him like that.”

“Okay,” they all said and abruptly sat down. 

“Um… that was weird,” I whispered.

“It’s charmspeak,” Chris murmured to himself, looking down. I leaned over the aisle to him and used my pointer finger to lift up his head by his chin, looking at him.

“It’s what?” I asked, staring into his large, light brown eyes.

“And the tease wonders why people fall for him so easily,” Jewel said to Snow, causing Snow to let out a laugh. At those words I jumped back into my seat, looking down toward the ground at my sneakers.

“Children of Aphrodite have the power to command others to do what they say.”

“That’s so cool!” Jewel screeched. “I wish I knew that sooner.”

I, on the other hand, just had a horrifying revelation.

“Steve,” Snow said. “You okay? You look intense. And your eyes…”

“What’s wrong, Steve?” Rob asked with a worried tone. “Why are you scared?”

“Is that why I’ve been able to have so many... partners?” I asked quietly. “Because I forced them to?”

“Steve, sweetie,” Jewel started. I turned to her.

“Jewel - that makes me no better th- than, than him.”

“Don’t you dare think that,” Rob said immediately, gently grabbing my wrist. “Ever. I can say for sure that you didn’t force me. You aren’t like that - like your father.”

“But-”

“Actually,” Chris said, interrupting me. “He’s right. Charmspeak only works when the person being manipulated has a small want or desire to do something along the lines of what you’re telling them to do.”

“See?” Jewel said while absentmindedly braiding a large lock of Snow’s hair. “Even if you were charmtelling or whatevering them, they probably wanted you anyway.”

“How could they not,” Rob mumbled. “Sorry, that slipped. Continue… actually, don’t. Chris, how do you know all of this? You never really answered us.”

“That’s because…” Chris started, turning his head to look out the window. “I’m a monster, too.”

At those words, Jewel, Rob and I tensed up. Snow, though, lunged across the aisle, wrapping her hand around Chris’ neck, attracting the attention of the few other passengers on the train. The temperature suddenly dropped, causing a toddler to cry on the other end of the train car.

“What do you mean, a monster?” Snow spat.

Chris lifted up his hands in a pleading way. 

“Calm down, Elsa, I’m a good monster,” Chris said quickly, a slight but noticeable tone of fear in his voice. “A satyr. Half goat, half man. We help moderate Camp Half-Blood by finding campers in the mortal world.”

“Oh,” Snow said letting go of her grip on Chris, sitting back down as the temperature returned to normal. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Chris said grinning. “It was a bad joke. And are you sure you aren’t a child of Khione?” Snow only rolled her eyes at him. “But yeah, I’m a satyr. I wear the hat so you can’t see my horns.”

He removed his cap only to reveal two small horns.

“Well that was unexpected,” Jewel commented.

Rob next to him poked one of the horns. “Interesting.”

“And the crutches are because I have to shove on these fake feet to cover up my hooves.” Chris took off his shoe to show a really realistic looking, but still evidently fake, foot.”

“How come no one else notices the horns and all?” I queried.

“Oh, yeah! That’s what I wanted to tell you,” Chris said. “There’s something created my Hecate, the goddess of magic, called the Mist. It’s this magicalish force that blocks most mortals from seeing things like monsters and other you know... things like that. Sorry if I sort of suck ass at explaining this stuff, you guys are actually the first demigods from around here for many decades.

"I know all of this is really a lot to take in, but if it makes you feel any better, you're actually taking it better than most demigods do when they first hear about this stuff."

"My grandmother just died because of an explosion caused by some monster lady. I'm open to any sort of explanation that makes sense. and as weird and crazy as it sounds, it still does... sort of."

"I'm really sorry to hear that," Chris responded softly. "Demigods have a scent that attract monsters, like a beacon. It gives them dangerous lives. I knew there were a few demigods in the school, but A) I wasn't really in the two friend circles you're all in so I didn't figure out it was the four of you until recently and B) even if I was and I knew the identities of the demigods, us satyrs aren't really allowed to take demigods to camp without an immediate threat in the area... like empousai, for example." 

"How did Steve's grandfather know all of this information, too? Like how he was a child of Aphrodite and all?" Rob demanded.

"I was able to get into all of your legal guardians around a week ago and tell them the basics. You know, like you're all children of Greek gods and there's a place in New York they could take you if they wanted. After all, if I could get them to willingly take you to camp it wouldn't technically be against any of our rules," Chris replied.

"Really? I'm surprised my father didn't take the first opportunity to ditch me when he found all this out," Jewel added.

"He probably didn't believe it," Snow said. "I wouldn't have at first, even now it's still hard to believe. You'll have to actually show us this place for me to fully believe what you're saying."

"Well," Chris started as he glanced at a silver watch on his right wrist. "We still have about an hour until we get to New York. It'll be a little past seven then, you'll probably be hungry. We'll go get some food in the city, then go to Camp Half-Blood." He then suddenly smiled at the four of us. "The camp has really become something great now that two past heroes - Percy Jackson and Annabeth Chase - help run the place. They've done a lot of great things, but now they're mostly focused on improving the camp to compete against our Roman rivals. You'll see when we get there. Just relax for now or something." Chris then closed his eyes to get a short nap in before they arrived in the city.

But Jewel stopped listening to Chris halfway through that last part, putting on her headphones to listen to calming music as she went into some weird meditative state next to me.

"Jewel?" Rob asked, lifting a hand to poke her.

"Don't bug her when she's like that," Snow said, slapping his arm away.

"When I first interrupted her, she flipped out at me, giving me a long lecture about how I'll screw up her chakras and taint her soul and all," I added in, old memories from a few months ago resurfacing in my mind.

"She used a lot harsher language than that, Steve," Snow inputted. "There were a lot more 'fucks' and 'shits' in there."

"She really must take that junk seriously to get so mad," Rob said thoughtfully.

"It was horrifying," I whispered.

"I didn't think it was possible for you to be cuter, but seeing you with hazel eyes, I think I've been proven wrong. How did I not n-"

"Stop. Flirting. Rob. You're an ex for a reason," Snow said coldly, glaring at Rob. I gave him a pitiful apologetic look before I closed my eyes, the built up exhaustion from the unexpectedly eventful day finally taking hold of my body in seconds.

••••

“Steve? Wake up, Stevie, we’re here.” I heard Jewel’s voice as she gently shook my shoulder. Opening my eyes, I saw her faintly smiling at me. “You look so cute when you’re asleep,” she giggled. “Sweet and… peaceful, in a way. But no more time for that. Chris is gonna take us to some food place before we go to this ‘Camp Half-Blood’ of his.”

I yawned and stood up, leaning on her shoulder for support as we walked out of the train to where the others were waiting. 

“Good morning Sleeping Beauty,” Snow commented while rolling her eyes. “Welcome back to civilization.”

“Where are we going,” I mumbled.

“There’s a McDonald’s a few blocks away,” Chris replied. “Ready to go?”

The four of us nodded and followed him out of the train station and down a few streets to a McDonald’s near a busy intersection of the city. When we walked through the doors, Jewel gasped and turned to Chris.

“Wait,” she said stopping abruptly, causing me to walk into her.

“Sorry,” I muttered. But Jewel only rolled her eyes teasingly, used to me apologizing for things that weren’t necessarily my fault. “I don’t have any money on me.”

“Neither do I,” Rob added, patting his pocket.

“None of us do,” Snow said. “When we came to you we really weren’t expecting to be torn out of Swedesboro to go to a McDonald’s in New York.”

“I know you weren’t,” Chris replied. He leaned one of his crutches against the wall to the left of our group and fished a credit card out of his pocket. “That’s why I came prepared.” 

“You shouldn’t have to pay for us like that. We-”

I got cut off by Jewel’s finger on my lips in a “shushing” motion. “That’s so nice of you, Chris,” she said, smiling charmingly. I’ll have a sweetened iced tea. Oh, and get me one of their salads - with no dressing. I don’t need all that saturated fat ruining this body.” She motioned toward her stomach.

“Just get me a vanilla milkshake,” Snow said. “I already ate something before we left.”

“A Big Mac for me, with a Sprite,” Rob said. “Although I feel kinda guilty for asking this of you.”

“And I’d feel guilty if you all went unfed. Steve?”

“I don’t want anything,” I answered.

“Steve, I told you it’s my-”

“Not because I don’t want to spend your money, Chris,” I said, quickly cutting him off. “I don’t really have much of an appetite after, well… yeah.” 

“Oh,” Chris said, remembering the event that occurred a few hours ago. “That, uh… makes sense.” He cleared his throat, then moved into the line of people waiting to order. “Why don’t you four find a table while I order the food?”

••••

About fifteen minutes later and only me and Chris sat at the table. The girls and Rob all went to the bathrooms since we were about to head out again to the camp.

“You should’ve eaten something, Steve. You might get hungry on the way there,” Chris informed.

“Why are you doing this?” I asked in reply.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, why are you helping us like this?”

“Well, technically it is my job to -”

“Pay for our food? Be so… courteous?” I said interrupting him, glaring. “What’s your motive here?”

“You know, for someone so shy you can be sorta scary when you want to be,” Chris replied. “And my motive is helping you. I’m just trying to be nice.”

“Yeah, right.”

“Have you ever completely trusted anyone other than Snow and Jewel since your father molested you?” he interrogated, putting me on the spot.

Everyone in Swedesboro knew what happened with me and my dad. It’s not like it was some criminally infested town where crimes and muggings happen daily - things like that get noticed. But like Snow, I didn’t let this past abuse break me. At least, not entirely. He’s in custody, and I have a restraining order. He won’t hurt me again. Can’t hurt me. Not anymore. I stopped having nightmares about it around a year or two ago. But what he did still changed me. Not just the rape, the insults, too. He said I was useless, spoiled, vain, a horrible excuse for a child. I realized a long time ago that that was probably the reason I’m as shy as I am today. I don’t want to hog everyone’s attention like some stereotypical selfish daughter, right? People have their own problems, they don’t need to hear about my own, right? And although I’m not necessarily proud in whoring myself, I don’t really regret it either. I did it so I could find the one. And what if the One was standing right in front of me the whole time, and I didn’t know it? Plus, the sex was really, really good. I guess I mislead people with my… reserved personality. I’m really dirty, huh. Wait… what was the point of this? I guess, the words and names my father called me made me shy (except for when a guy or girl caught my interest) and the actions he did made me such a slut. Huh. I’m like a living contradiction.

“I’m not really the most trusting person, yeah, you could say that. But um… sorry. For questioning you, I guess.”

“Reverting back to your regularly shy self, hm? Good. It’s the Steve I’m used to,” Chris said smiling. “You know, your friends seem to really take forever.”

“We’re girls, get used to it.”

Snow and Jewel suddenly appeared behind Chris’ seat, startling him.

“I had to reapply my lipstick, okay,” Jewel explained. “And fix my wingtips. I can’t believe that they were uneven this whole time!”

“Where’s Rob?” I asked.

“Still in the bathroom, I guess. Maybe taking a shit. I don’t know,” Snow said. “Go get him. I don’t want to walk around the city when the sun goes down.”

Chris stood up so I could get out of the booth, and I walked around the restaurant toward the bathroom. Stepping in, I saw Rob at one of the sinks looking in the mirror and fidgeting around with his eye.

“Rob?”

“Steve? Crap,” Rob said.

“What are you doing?” I questioned, standing next to him. “Do you have an eyelash in your eye or something?

“Something like that,” was the muttered response. “I somehow… blinked the contact out of my eye while we were eating.” He briefly paused. “I didn’t really want you to see this.”  
“What? Why?” I asked.

“I don’t know, I… sorta thought you’d think it was unattractive or something.”

I blushed faintly at how he said me specifically. “Being the insecure guy is my job,” I said. “Two is too many, and I can’t have you taking my job, right?”

Rob laughed in return. A sweet, pure sound I always loved to hear from him when we dated. “I thought I remembered you having a sense of humor in there somewhere, even if it is buried pretty deep inside you.” He laughed again, poking my stomach with his right hand. But his finger stayed on my stomach, making me look down at it. Rob’s finger slowly moved down so he could pull up my shirt. He rubbed his other soft hand across my stomach.

“I missed these,” he said smiling softly. He lifted his head up to look into my eyes, right hand leaving its grip on my shirt to cup my cheek, trapping his left one onto my stomach. “I missed you.”

For the second time that day, time seemed to fade. Rob blinked his gorgeous gray eyes four times at me, his long eyelashes fluttering like the wings of a hummingbird, and right then I suddenly forgot all of the horrible and confusing things that happened earlier that day. On the last blink he kept them closed and slowly leaned his head in toward mine, steadily closing the small gap between us. And of course, just as I was about to close my eyes, the door into the bathroom opened.

"Guys, you need to hurry up, Snow wants to- oh. Um... were you two having some kind of romantic moment in here?"

We stared at Chris like two deer caught in a truck's headlights, blushing intensely, time rushing back at full speed. 

"Actually..." Rob started.

"No, Chris, it's fine," I said quickly, pushing Rob's hand out of my shirt and backing up about a foot and a half. "If Snow wants to go it's probably getting dark out." I looked at Rob with my best "can-we-just-please-pretend-this-never-happened face." 

"Yeah..." Rob murmured grimly. "We should go."

Sighing to myself, I followed Chris out of the bathroom, Rob trailing behind me. We regrouped with the girls and headed out of the McDonald's.

Maybe Chris interrupting us was some sort of omen. He wasn't the One, that was, like, preposterous... right? It was probably for the best. 

••••

Our group stood at the foot of a grassy hill topped off with a large evergreen. All of us were tired from the walk here - some more than others because of the added energy reduction of digestion - and now Chris was telling us we needed to climb some hill? Ugh.

"You're saying it's just over this hill?" Jewel questioned as we started the ascent toward the large pine. Chris ditched his crutches, shoes, and feet a few minutes before and put them into a drawstring bag apparently enchanted 

"Yep."

"Does this place have any sort of protection from the monsters?" Rob inquired.

"Lady Hecate not only created the Mist to protect our identities, she also put up a few magical barriers to border the camp and protect our lives." 

"This Lady Hecate seems to really help out the demigods here," I said.

"I think she wanted to help out as like an apology for being on the opposing side of the gods in a few wars," Chris answered.

"Wars?" Snow queried. "What do you mean wars." 

"That's something that'll take too long for me to explain. You'll learn about stuff like that in your Greek history classes."

"School?!" Jewel asked, panting from walking up the steep incline. "I thought being demigods would get us away from that."

"It's nothing like school," Chris told us. "Just small... tutoring sessions. From other campers, too. Nothing like school."

"I for one think it's good that we'll be learning something still," said Rob.

"Of course you do, Smarty Athena Child," I responded with some snark.

"Smarty Athena Child?"

"I could abbreviate it and call you Sac,” I said, giggling. 

"Suddenly Smarty Athena Child seems appealing."

"I'm still so calling you Sac," I said glancing at him, still giggling like a toddler.

But, with my amazing luck, in the two seconds I spent looking at Rob, I walked straight into a long branch of the pine tree on the top of the hill.

"Shocker," I muttered to myself, holding the spot on my head where it bumped into one of the branches. I glanced up at the tall pine tree, really looking at it for the first time. One of the branches seemed to have some sort of yellow fleece on it - weird - and if I looked really high, I could see the head of a sleeping dragon. An actual damn dragon. That was definitely something to talk to Chris about later. When I looked over at the others though, Chris was smiling warmly and the other three demigods were staring wondrously ahead of them, faces flushed from climbing. Even Snow looked pretty awestruck. 

"Wow," I whispered amazed at the large camp - which looked more like a small town - below.

"Welcome- actually, walk a few more steps past the border, can you?" Chris requested. "So my welcoming can be somewhat official-ish?"

The others and I walked through the invisible border (which felt like walking through a thin wall of Jell-O). Chris then said giddily:

"Welcome to Camp-Half Blood!"


	4. A New Start With a Clean Slate

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first night at Camp Half-Blood where we meet some of the old characters and see a little bit about how Steve and Rob are developing.

A New Start With A Clean Slate

 

The sight before me was… magnificent, in a way. A huge, flat grassy area with a large, bright blue house on one end and rows upon rows of buildings in the center of it.. A large forest laid on a side of the camp, and on the other was a large wall with lava pouring down from it.

“You call this a camp?” Rob asked.

“Well, it was a camp before, in a way,” Chris explained. “Most kids only really stayed for the summers, then went back into the mortal world for school and all. But the camp changed when Percy and Annabeth got here. Annabeth - who’s actually your older sister - was incredibly smart, and always loved architecture, too. So after the wars finished, Percy kept egging Annabeth on to make Camp Half-Blood something similar of Camp Jupiter. The Roman camp has a huge city called New Rome where demigods can live their whole lives at, and Percy thought the Greeks should have that, too. Technically this city is still being planned and all, but for the time being we replaced the old cabins with little apartment buildings - each one houses the children of each god. Since some of the gods didn’t really like that their cabins were being taken down, we added a huge room onto the Big House - the blue house over there - that has a bunch of shrines for the gods. The city is gonna be built where the forest is. But as much as I hate that we’re destroying a forest, we are going to plant a bunch of new trees in place of the Climbing Wall so the dryads can move their homes to those ones.”

“There sure are a lot more buildings than you’d think,” Snow commented.

“I know,” Chris said. “There are a lot more gods than you think. Let’s just say some like Lord Zeus are a little… active when it comes to making godly children. But not demigods.”

“Huh?” Jewel questioned. “Why?”

“Well, Zeus, Poseidon and Hades, or the Big Three for short, all swore on the River Styx - which is like, a really super serious promise - to not have any demigod children again. I think one of their children started one of the world wars or something like that. But, even though they made that pact, Poseidon and Zeus didn’t really follow it. Poseidon fell in love with Percy’s mom, and well, the result was Percy. Zeus has two children: Thalia and Jason Grace. Except he actually made Jason in his Roman form, Jupiter.” 

“And Hades didn’t break it, too?” I asked.

“Actually, no,” Grover responded. “His two living demigod children are sort of… weird. Nico di Angelo was born before the pact was made, but put into a charmed hotel called the Lotus that really slows down the aging process. And Hazel Levesque was brought back by Nico from the dead.”

“Fascinating,” Rob said under his breath.

I rolled my eyes at him. “Sac.”

“That’s going to make me so uncomfortable.”

“Whatever, Sacky.”

“Ugh, enough,” Snow grunted. “Chris? Where are we going next in this ‘camp’ of yours?”  
“Ours,” he quickly corrected. “Whether you like it or not, this is gonna be your home now. Has to be. It’s the only place other than Camp Jupiter you’ll be safe at. Otherwise, well, you’re not only a danger to yourselves, but innocent mortals, too.”

I quickly tensed up at those words. “So… my grandma dying was my fault?”

“Nononono!” Chris said immediately. “It’s not your fault - you guys didn’t know what you were until just a few hours ago.”

“I’m still having trouble grasping all this,” Jewel admitted.

“Who could blame you? But what I’m trying to say is, it’ll be your fault from this point on if someone dies just because you don’t want to live here at camp. You get that, right?”

“Yeah, yeah, we get it. I don’t really care,” Snow said bluntly. “Can you actually answer my question now?”

“Sorry,” Chris said, grinning sheepishly as he ran a hand through the hair between his small horns. “We’re going to the Big House.” We started walking down the hill toward the large blue house at the foot of the hill. “Oh, and by the way, one of the two camp’s instructors is actually a god - Dionysus.”

“Sorry, but uh… who?” I inquired.

“He’s the god of wine and theatre and insanity and stuff like that, so uh, don’t tick him off. He can be a little antsy sometimes, but he’s not all that bad. Just be respectful. And the other instructor is a centaur, Chiron. You know, he’s half horse. So don’t be surprised when you see his horse body.”

“I absolutely adore horses!” Jewel exclaimed. “Steve, remember the time you grandpa took us horseback riding? That was so fun!”

I smiled at the memory. “It was.”

“That’s common with children of Aphrodite. And Poseidon, actually, since he created horses from the sea and Aphrodite came from the sea too or something like that.”

“Do you have regular horses here? Like, um, without humans poking out of them?” I asked.

Chris laughed at that. “Technically, no. We have pegasi instead.”

“Pegasi are real?” Snow asked.

“Oh my God! Or gods, now, but whatever! I can’t wait to meet the pegasi!” Jewel screeched.

“Yes, they’re real, Snow,” Chris said. “This is real. Try to start believing it, huh?”

“You can’t blame her for not, though,” Rob inputted, which in return earned him a weird and confused glance from Snow for him sort of backing her up on something. “This is all so… surreal. And I don’t really know if it’s the good kind or the bad kind.”

“The bad kind,” I muttered.

“Hey,” Jewel said. “Don’t always think so negative.”

“How-”

“I know you had a bad first impression on being a demigod today, but that was one horrible experience in a new world that could be filled with a thousand great ones. So don’t always be such a pessimist, okay.”

“I get it from her,” I said pointing at Snow, who just shrugged. 

We reached the foot of the hill a few moments later, standing in front of the Big House where we saw a few silhouettes of people in the distance running towards us. They were obviously short and their bodies looked pretty young, but the setting sun behind them made it hard to see any of their facial features.

“Chris! Chris!”

“Chrissy, you’re back!”

Suddenly the two figures’ silhouettes had wings fly out on each side of them, and they flew (relatively close to the ground, but they were still flying) speedily toward us. In only a few seconds the two kids stood close enough in front of our small group to where I could see them much clearer. They were obviously twins - one boy and one girl - who looked to be around seven years.

“Who are they?” the boy asked as his wings disappeared out of thin air, followed by the girl’s.

“Are they the new guys you’ve been looking for all this time?” she asked.

“Does that mean you can stay here the whole week and not just the weekends?” the other asked excitedly.

“I don’t know for sure, Joshua. And Janelle, for the sake of the gods, how many times have I told you to stop calling me Chrissy?”

“Sorry Chrissy,” was Janelle’s pouted response.

“You two shouldn’t be outside so late. It’s almost nine! Get some rest,” Chris told the two, and their wings reappeared as they flew off back into the distance.

“What the hell?” asked Jewel. And to be fair, the rest of us were just as shocked as her.

“Winged children really shouldn’t be that shocking at this point,” Chris said amused. “Children of Nike, the victory goddess. Her only children here, actually. They’ve been here since they were four. Lady Nike has wings, her children have wings. I don’t know why other gods with wings don’t pass them down, but you know, they’re the gods, they do what they want.”

“I’m never going to get used to this,” I said.

“That’s what they all say,” Chris replied. “Now come on in! Chiron and Mr. D have been expecting some new arrivals from your town for a while.”

We followed him through the door to the sky blue mansion, into a large empty room with many doorways leading into others.

“Where are they?” Jewel asked.

“They’re probably on the back deck playing cards or something with Argus, our security guard, if he’s not in the infirmary. He has, like, a hundred eyes all over his body, so if you see him-”

“Don’t be surprised, yeah,” Snow cut in. “We get it.”

Chris led us to the back end of the house where sure enough, a centaur, a tall bearded man with a bottle of diet coke, and a blonde guy with eyes all over the visible parts of his skin.

“Mr. D, Chiron,” Chris called out to them. “I’ve finally brought the new arrivals!”

The bearded man turned around to face the four of us, then rolled his eyes. “Great, more demigods.”

“Dionysus!” the centaur scolded. “Ignore him,” he said turning his head to us. He started walking - no, trotting? over to us and smiled. “He’s not particularly fond of heroes.”

“Why?” I asked quietly. “They… We can’t be all that bad, right?”

“You’re not bad as in bad people, you’re bad as in annoying and a waste of my time,” he argued, his creepily purple eyes glaring at me. “Thank my father that he’s letting me go back to Olympus next year so I can actually be with my wife instead if getting small visits from her while I’m off babysitting you vexing children. If I wasn’t the god of insanity I’d have been insane decades ago.”

“Thank you, Mr. D!” Chiron said with mock happiness. “Let’s go into the living room, hm? He seems to be in a worse mood than usual.”

“I kinda liked him,” Snow said while we followed Chiron back in the house through a maze of doors and hallways.

“Of course you would,” Rob said.

We finally made it into a large living room with a few couches, one of which had three girls sitting on it engaged in a conversation. When we entered the room, one of them, a young blonde woman, smiled kindly at us.

“Chiron, I see we have a few new campers!” she said happily. “Good evening, I’m Annabeth Chase, one of Athena’s daughters. Who are you four?”

“Hi, newbies” the redhaired woman to her right said. “I’m Rachel, the Oracle of this place. I just give out prophecies and such every once and a while.”

“Clarisse la Rue,” the last girl grunted with a head nod. 

“Well, I’m Rob. Robert Towamense if you want to be official,” Rob said with a small wave.

“You’ve got to be one of my younger siblings,” Annabeth noted. “You’re almost physically identical to the sons of Athena. Except maybe a bit more buffer and mature.”

“Jewel Grace Roa,” Jewel said happily. “Nice to meet you all!”

“Aphrodite kid,” Clarisse suggested.

“And this is Steve Domani,” Jewel continued. “He’s a little quiet.”

“Also probably-”

“Is there a reason you’re betting on our parents like some sort of guessing game?” Snow interrupted Clarisse. She huffed, rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. “Snow Hailtok. And no, my mother is not Khione. I can already see that you think she is - she’s not. She’s dead.”

“Do you really know that? Like for sure?” Rachel questioned. “Because that tends to be a common lie that-”

“Yes,” Snow said abruptly. “I saw it happen. She’s really dead. Rotting in the ground and all.”

“Well aren’t you a bundle of joy?” Clarisse said, eyes narrowed at her.

“Snow’s your actual first name?” Annabeth inquired curiously, wanting to change the topic. 

ont “No, it’s Allison,” Jewel answered for her. Snow glared slightly at her for that, but let her continue. “But she likes Snow better, so we call her Snow. And so will you!” 

“Um… okay,” Rachel said, noticing Jewel covering up the command with her overenthusiastic joy. “Anyway, instead of having us guess, do any of you really know for sure who your godly parent is?”

“My grandfather said that me and Jewel were children of Aphrodite, but I don’t really know if that’s believable,” I said shyly. My shyness comes out in weird ways. Whenever I meet new people or I’m with people who I’m not comfortable with, I put up my walls in a way. But if I’m with people like Jewel or Snow, or I guess if I have a partner at the time - them too, I come out of my shell.

“I think it is, Steve,” Rachel said with a warm smile. “Clarisse said it earlier, too. But that doesn’t matter, because you’ll be claimed by your parent anyway soon enough.”

“Well,” Chiron said. “It seems I don’t need to do to the introduction, hm? You three girls are already taking care of that.” He smiled at us. “I live here in the big house. If you ever need any help or advice or assistance, I can assure you I’ll try to be here to give it. Christopher, you should probably head home before the sun fully sets.” And with that he trotted out of the living room.

“Chiron’s right,” Chris agreed. “I’ll head out. See you guys tomorrow.”

“Why is everyone acting like we’re going to stay here?” Snow asked. “As much as Chris blabbed on about how great this place and you’re changing it for the better and all, I’ve yet to see anything fabulous.”

“Listen, chick,” Clarisse cut in. “We aren’t acting. The four of you either stay here, or you live with mortals and put their lives along with your own in danger of monsters. And judging by the fact that you obviously didn’t come here willingly and how there’s a huge bloody stain on Steve’s shirt, that’s already happened.”

“She’s right,” Annabeth said. “Having the death of a mortal is never something a demigod wants to have on their conscience,”

“I for one, want to stay,” Jewel commented. “Think about it guys - a safe place, a new start with a clean slate. We have a whole new life now! We can escape not only monsters, but all of the bull from before here. Plus, I’m not gonna pass on a chance to live in a place with pegasi. Actual, living pegasi!”

“You’re smarter than you seem,” Rob added. “And I’ll stay too, I guess.” He then turned to me. “But only if you stay, too.”

I felt my face flush at that, causing Snow to roll her eyes. “I’ll stay too if both Steve and Jewel do.”

All eyes turned on me, and I really wanted to sink into the ground and hide under the floorboards, I was only hu… I was only demigod? Whatever, you get the point. “Why do I have to make the decision?” I said, slightly annoyed. “I mean, there’s no real good reason not to stay… So we will.”

“Yay!” Jewel exclaimed.

“But for now, we should all get back to our homes before dark,” Annabeth said. “There’s a pack of harpies that come out during the night to hunt down any misbehaving half-bloods. And let’s just say they’re always hungry.”

“You’re right, I’ll go back to my cave,” Rachel said, then let out a small laugh. “That’ll never stop sounding weird. At least it’s private.”

“Since Rachel’s the Oracle, she lives and tells prophecies inside of a cave on the borders of camp. Clarisse and I will be heading back to our ‘cabins,’” Annabeth said using air quotes on ‘cabin.’ “I assume Chris told you about the buildings during your travel here. You four will sleep upstairs in the guest rooms, since you haven’t been officially claimed and you can’t actually sleep with your siblings. We used to put newbies in with the Hermes kids but that changed when the cabins were replaced with apartment buildings. And we’ll introduce you to the rest of the camp tomorrow morning at breakfast. It’s at nine, so try not to be asleep. Sweet dreams!”

Although the thought of being publicly introduced to a huge bunch of demigods (some had to be my age, what would they think of me?) made my eyes widen with fear, I didn’t have much time to think with Jewel yanking me, Snow and Rob out of one of the doorways into the hall we were in before. “I think there were stairs over this way, come on!”

She dragged us through a few halls before sure enough, there was a staircase in the end of one. When we reached another hallway of bedrooms at the top, we saw multiple doors, three of which on the far end of the hall had names on them - Dionysus, Chiron, and Argus. But only two said “Guest” on them. 

“There’s only two?” Rob asked. “So how are-” 

“Ooh! Snow!” Jewel said happily while peeking into the guest room on the right. “I like this one!” She pulled Snow into the room and shut the door behind them, shouting “Goodnight!” from the other side of it.

“Well I guess we don’t have to choose,” Rob said. I felt a lot more comfortable that I was back alone with someone I actually knew, but I was still a little flustered that I was about to spend the night with Rob.

I opened the door to the other guest room, turning on the lights, and upon walking in the two of us noticed a full bed in the middle of the room with nightstands on either side. There was another door in the corner that probably led to a bathroom.

“You know, I could sleep on-” 

“Don’t even think about it Rob. It’s early April in New York, not the warmest of places or times. There’s only one bed with one big blanket, and we’re sharing it.”

“Oh…”

“What, are you disappointed?”

“No! Of course not!” Rob quickly said. “Never with you.”

I blushed, and after a few seconds of silence, Rob asked me, “How’s your shoulder.”

“Oh, wow. It stopped hurting on the train, and I completely forgot about it.”

I felt Rob’s eyes on my body as I took off my shirt, but looking down at my shoulder, I noticed that all that was left was a scar.

“Woah,” Rob said. “I guess that healing stuff really did work.” He rubbed two soft fingers up my arm from my elbow to my bare shoulder, causing me to shudder. But this felt exactly like what’d happened at the McDonald’s, and I honestly didn’t want to repeat that. 

“We should probably get some sleep,” I said, and I brushed his hand away. “I’m still exhausted from today.” I sat on the bed, pulled off my jeans, and got under the blanket in my boxer briefs. Rob just stood there for a moment, but then stripped down to his boxers as well and laid next to me. After a few moments of awkward silence, Rob asked, “Do you want to talk about what happened in the bathroom?”

“Not really,” I admitted, turning my head to look at him. “But we should. Look… It’s like Jewel said, this place is a clean slate. The people here don’t know me as the whore they can go to to quickly get laid . They don’t even know me at all yet. So I’m gonna… reinvent myself. I’ll try being less shy. I’m not gonna be so easy anymore. It didn’t really get me what I wanted anyway.”

“What are you -”

Before he could finish his sentence, I placed my lips onto his, in a quick, chaste kiss.

“Ummm…”

“That’s all you’re gonna get,” I said, with the slightest bit of remorse that he better not have noticed. “I want you to take that as motivation. To keep trying. I mean, you’re hot and you’re really sweet, but… if I adopt a kid one day, and you end up as my husband, I want to tell them a long rom-com story about how you made me fall in love with you, you know? So do that. Make me fall in love with you. I think I’d like that. Ugh, that really sounds atten-”

“Steve, I get it,” Rob said, smiling. “I won’t stop trying, and I know I can succeed. Now, let’s sleep, hm? Long day tomorrow.”

I could tell from the heavy breathing that after a few minutes passed, Rob fell asleep. After a while, he unconsciously wrapped an arm around me. 

I let it happen.


	5. Settling

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first part of the first day at camp!

Settling

 

An unusually vivid image of a girl falling from the sky filled my mind as I slept. She looked to be around sixteen, but it’s pretty hard to tell the age of a teenager. Her eyes were closed and her arms, head and legs sat limp like she was sleeping or unconscious as she slowly floated toward the ground. She softly landed on a patch of grass, where she laid on her back in an almost spread eagle position and her black hair spread out like a fan. The image of the grass under her morphed into a bed, sort of like one you’d see in a hospital. A large hand then laid on her shoulder, the owner of it out of my view. Suddenly her eyelids fluttered open, showing me a tiny glimpse of her soft candlelight orange eyes before I awoke with her.  
I sat up abruptly, shoving my head into a bare, muscular chest.  
“Most times when I wake people up, they don’t try to heabutt my pecs.”   
Rob laughed and backed up a little to give some space. Rubbing my eyes to wake them up, I took in the sight in front of me: a shirtless Rob. He had actual abs. Not like my little faint things. Like he actually had a nice defined, chest with a good six pack. But not crazy muscular either like a bodybuilder. He was always in his pool practicing for a swimming competition when he wasn’t studying for a test or quiz. Completely clean of body hair because of that, too. And his face, chiseled from stone. But it was all so natural! A lot of guys spend so much time putting up their hair in some weird way or posing with some “sexy seductive face” for an Instagram photo. But Rob? This hunk just had to roll out of bed in the morning and he was already perf… hot. Already hot. Maybe he was a Greek god. Thankfully, I was able to resist licking my lips in front of him. I said I wouldn’t be so easy anymore, and I needed to keep that promise. For myself. Even though it was incredibly difficult to not just go ahead and kiss Rob again - ugh. I need to stop it.  
“You know, Steve, we could sit here an ogle each other’s bodies and all,” Rob said with the faintest hint of red on his cheeks. “But it’s half past eight, we’re just waking up, and we still don’t actually know where we’re supposed to go for breakfast. So let’s get ready, and I guess we’ll get the girls and see if anyone downstairs can tell us where to go.”  
I yawned and nodded, and glanced over to the nightstand on the side of the bed I was laying on. A pair of fresh clothes for both me and Rob sat on it along with a note.  
I think these clothes will fit you guys, hopefully I got the sizes right. Rachel left some for Snow and Jewel, too. Grab them and find Argus. He’s probably in the infirmary, he spends a lot of time helping out there. He’ll show you where the dining pavilion is. See you soon  
-Chris  
“Chris says Argus will tell us where the pavilion that we eat at is.”  
“Then let’s put on some clothes and find him.”  
I most certainly did not put when Rob slipped on a shirt. Which is really true, because the shirt Chris gave him was just a little too tight, showing . I guess staring at him from a distance doesn’t count as hooking up with him, right? Of course not. So I’ll just be doing that. A whole lot of that.  
****  
“So is the infirmary another building or something?” Jewel asked as we walked down the stairs. “Because then we’ll need to ask someone to find that for us.”  
“I think it’s actually a room here," Rob replied. "I think I saw it when we were walking through yesterday."  
"They don't call this the Big House for nothing."  
Rob led us through the maze of the Big House to where the infirmary was. Only a few people were inside - Argus, and two weirdly cuddly guys, one pale with dark hair and a much tanner one with dark yellow. The contrast was kind of funny, really.  
"Hello!" Jewel said happily like the usually outgoing person she was. "Argus?" she said turning turned to the hundred-eyed man who smiled and nodded. "Chris left a letter saying you'll show us where to go for breakfast?"  
"You're the new people Rachel mentioned that came in last night? That " the blonde asked, looking the four of us up and down. "Argus, you don't need to take them, we can do it. Right, Nico?" The blonde glanced with a slight demand at the Nico-person. He sighed.  
"I wanted some somewhat private time, though," he answered, but the other didn't move his glare. "Fine, Will." Nico put on a visibly strained smile. "Welcome to the family, follow us to the pavilion."  
"A people person for sure," Snow commented.  
"Like you're any better," I said smiling at her, but then noticed Nico staring at me. "Um... hi?"  
"He likes to try and analyze people," Will explained.  
“Well that’s a little judgmental,” Snow said.   
"I think spending so much time with Annabeth recently made him think he was her brother."  
"Oh, shut up," Nico said, lightly tapping Will's cheek as a sort of slap. "You know how Percy is. He insisted I spent more friend time with them. More like third wheel time."  
"I've been hearing a lot about this Percy guy," Rob said. "But I haven't met him. Who is he?"   
"He's kind of famous in the demigod world," Will replied. "For his big part in both of the wars years ago. But then again, so are you." He turned to Nico.  
"I am not some little celebrity."  
"Nico here had to teleport himself along with two other people and a huge statue across the world to stop the Greeks and Romans from killing each other. He also in a way killed the man who wanted to erase all Greek demigods from existence."  
"Stop showing me off like some sort of trophy!" Nico argued, embarrassed.  
"Fine," Will said giggling. "Enough with the history lessons."  
We made it outside the Big House and followed our two (obviously in love with each other) guides toward another hill that did indeed have a sort of pavilion on top of it.   
"This is going to be our first time meeting new people here!" Jewel exclaimed happily.  
"Ugh," Snow said with discontent.  
"You just need to stick with me, Snow," Jewel said to her. "I think we all know you won't be making any new friends on your own. Same with you, Mr. Stevie Shypants. And Rob'll follow you around like your pet so he'll be with us anyway."  
"Who says we need more friends?" Jewel asked. "It was always just the three of us anyway. And we already have a plus one with Rob."  
"Maybe this is our chance to change that," I said.  
"Was not expecting you to be an advocate for the 'more friends' campaign," Snow said.  
"I'm not saying we should befriend like the whole camp," I explained. "Just get like, I don't know, three new friends or something. Find another tight trio we can shove ourselves in. To be an actual group of friends."  
"I hate it when you're right."  
I looked over to see that Nico and Will were no longer with us.   
"Where'd they go?" I asked.  
"Probably left to go make out or something," Rob said.  
“Promise me you two won’t be doing that?”  
“Snow!” I yelled flustered, slightly hiding my face in Jewel’s shoulder.  
“Oh, shush, you two,” Jewel said. “Come on, we have to climb up another hill.”  
“At least this one isn’t as steep,” Rob said.  
“But there’s people at the top.” Okay, maybe my goal to be less shy wasn’t as easy as I hoped it would be. I mean, we were climbing a hill that had an entire race on top of it. All of those people, staring at us. What would they be thinking? Would any of them actually want to be a friend? I haven’t necessarily made any friends - ever - other than Jewel and Snow. And Rob now, I guess. But I don’t really know what to call him. A friend for now.  
“Stevie Sourpuss’ Pessimism will not affect me,” Jewel said. “There are a lot of people in the world, and some of them are like us. I’m sure someone like us will be here, too. And they will be our friend.”  
“But-” I started.  
“Shush,” Jewel demanded, causing Rob to give out a small and barely noticeable laugh. It was more like a grunt, really.   
After only a few more moments of climbing the small hill toward the dining pavilion, we could hear Chiron’s booming voice beckoning from above.  
“...after all, word travels fast with how gossipy you all can be. So I’m sure you’ve heard…”  
“Oh Lord, I’m gonna have an anxiety attack.”  
Jewel hugged me to her left side while Snow rested a hand on my shoulder. Rob gently put his hand on my lower back and smiled at me. Those three actions gave me the slightest boost in confidence, so I pushed them all away after a few seconds. No need to burden them, I could do this. Had to, if I didn’t want to hunger myself to death. Not eating anything the night before made me starving, and I was in no mood to fast.  
We finally reached Hell, I mean the top of the mountain, where - Jesus - so many kids, teens, and young adults were sitting at a long array of wooden tables, in the center of which had a large fire. Chiron and Mr. D sat at one table in the corner of the pavilion.   
“Ah, we were just talking about you four!” Chiron said loudly. He then turned to the mass of tables. “Everyone, these are the four new arrivals. Rob, Snow, Steve, and Jewel. I expect them to be welcomed with open arms, as usual.” Chiron looked at us again. “You’ll most likely be claimed today, so be prepared. For now, join your new campmates and the wood nymphs will bring you something to eat in a few minutes. Enjoy!”  
All of the people finally took their eyes off of us (thankfully I didn’t need to run to get an anxiolytic) and I mumbled, “So where do we sit?”  
“It feels like joining a new school,” Snow commented.  
“There’s a guy over there who’s waving at us,” Rob noted while motioning his head to a smiling guy over at one of the tables in the middle of the pavilion. He sat with another guy and two girls, but since they were reasonably far away it was hard to see their faces.  
“Huh?” Jewel asked. “Oh, there! Let’s go!”  
Soon enough we were already at the strangers’ table, Jewel dragging Snow and I as Rob trailed behind amused. Now that we were right in front of the other group of four I could make out their faces. The guy who waved to us was a pretty cute and buff looking guy with dark brown hair and nice arms (he looked good in a tank top), a taller, lanky guy with glasses and short brown hair, a short blonde girl next to him, and a smiling, pretty black girl across from her. They all looked to be around seventeen to nineteen years old. Seemed like a decent enough group of people - but as soon as you say that, well… you get the message.  
“Hiya, newbies!” the dark skinned girl said. “Welcome to our creepily large family.”  
“Oddly accurate,” the taller guy added. “Since we’re all related in some way or another. Whether it be siblings, cousins, uncles, nieces…”  
Rob and I looked at each other, blushing, then looked at the ground.  
“Comforting thought, isn’t it?” the blonde said.  
“Sit down, come on,” the buff guy said, smiling. “It’s not really fun to eat standing up.”  
I looked around at the others, but of course, Jewel already sat down next to the blonde, pulling Snow with her. I quietly sat down next to the guy who just spoke, and Rob sat next to the other guy.  
“I’m Isabella,” the blonde said. “But call me Iggy. You’ll get used to it. And this is-”  
“I am fully capable of introducing myself, Ig-wad,” the guy in between Iggy and Rob said jokingly. “I’m Sean.”  
“Amber Uzuri,” the other girl said. “So nice to be some of the first to meet you guys!”  
“And I’m Dominic. Dominic Thorne. Call me whatever, D, Dom, Dominic,” the last one said. “It’s nice to have some new faces, we haven’t had new people our age for months.”  
“And the last person was a total bitch, too,” Iggy said. “Trista Suka. Daughter of Circe.”  
“Her last name literally means ‘bitch’ or ‘whore’ in Slovak,” Sean said laughing.  
“But it also means ‘love’ in a few other languages,” Amber countered. “Like Indonesian. Where her family is from. Don’t listen to those two, they’re just bitter she didn’t want to be in our little clique.”  
“Which is totally okay if you feel that way,” Dominic said quickly. “I mean, not everyone is the same, right?”  
“You seem okay,” Jewel said. “Trust me, we’re not bitches, too. Not even Snow, even though she can be a bit… cynipal.”  
“You mean cynical?” Rob asked grinning.  
“I never claimed to have a degree in words,” Jewel said laughing back.  
“So who are your god parents?” I muttered quietly.   
“What was that?” Dominic asked, resting a hand on my shoulder. “Speak up, no need to be shy,” was the teasing response.  
“I asked who your godly parents are,” I repeated, louder and clearer than before. “You’ve all been… claimed or whatever, right?”  
“Of course,” Dominic responded. “Antheia is my mother. She’s the goddess of flowers and such, hence the punny last name. If you feel the need I can grow you a tulip or something.” That guy was a child of a flower goddess? And not like a muscled bodybuilding god? Well that’s ironic.  
“Child of Hecate,” Iggy said. “So screw me over, and I’ll turn you into a sheep.”  
“No she won’t!” Sean said immediately. “Ignore her threats. She only turns other campers into sheep for a few hours during a capture the flag game. Usually. Anyway, I’m a son of Athena, goddess of wisdom and battle strategy.”  
“And my mother is Aphrodite,” Amber finished while twirling one of her black curls in a finger.  
“So you’ll be one of me and Steve’s sisters!” Jewel exclaimed, ecstatically overenthusiastic as usual.   
“Really?” Amber asked, just as happy. “Oh my gods, finally! Fun new siblings!”  
“Match made in Elysium,” Iggy muttered.  
“What about you?” Sean asked, turning to Rob. “Do you know whose child you are? Even though you haven’t been claimed yet, you look like some of my siblings. Or maybe an Apollo kid.”  
“Chris said that I might be another son of Athena, but I don’t know yet,” Rob said in return.  
“Well, Chris is a satyr,” Sean said. “He has a good sense of smell. They’re usually right with those things.”  
“And you?” Dominic asked, turning to Snow. “You seem pretty similar to the two kids of Khio-”  
“Not Khione,” Snow sighed, rolling her eyes at how she had to repeat herself again.   
“But she did do some pretty icy stuff on the train here,” Jewel inputted. “Like, the whole temperature just dropped.”  
“I can’t really think of another winterish god,” Amber said, pondering. “At least, not one that actually has children too often.”  
“Whatever,” Snow said. “I’ll find out later today. When are we getting the food?”  
“The nymphs will start bringing the breakfast out in a few minutes,” Dominic replied. “But as a ritual of sorts, we burn a bit of food we get in the fire as a sacrifice to a god of our choice. Usually we burn the offerings to our parents, of course, but it’s your decision.”  
“You should show us around later,” Jewel suggested. “Give us a tour. I want to see more of this place. After all, if this is our new home…”  
“I’m still having trouble grasping that,” I said.  
“... then I’d love to see what it has to offer!”  
“Sure,” Iggy answered. “Why not, right?”  
“Of course,” Dominic agreed. “After this, we’ll show you all of what Camp Half-Blood has to offer.” He looked at each of the four of us, finally resting his eyes on mine. His small grin widened just the smallest bit when he let his light green eyes - weirdly light, even like a pastel color - rest on my own (probably) dark brown ones. But I noticed it. And something in my gut told me that this new Dominic guy was attracted to me. Should I feel guilty that I thought he was kinda hot, too? I mean… Rob and I aren’t dating. He’s not my boyfriend. And I’m not in love with either of them or anything, right? I decided to just ignore it for a while, and I waited patiently for my food to come.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I might be posting a little less frequently because of school. Fuck school.


End file.
